We are often reminded that history repeats itself. And for those of us old enough to have lived through the ’30s and Hitler’s 12-year tyrannically destructive reign there are those of us in this generation who think we may be now seeing history repeating itself as we watch the seeds of tyranny begin to sprout, in our day, as they did during Hitler’s self-destructive reign — but not in far off Germany, Japan, or Russia, but right here in our own beloved America.

As I read of the scandals attributed to the current administration I think of that scripture in 1 Samuel 8 where the elders of Israel went to Samuel complaining about how his sons, then judges in Israel, were corrupt, and then asked for a king.

One has to be pretty blind not to see the corruption in this administration as they attempt to cover up their activities; a clear indication of corruption, and if not corruption, then certainly not in harmony with the moral principles clearly laid out in America’s founding documents.

As I think of today’s corruption in high (and low) places I am reminded of Benjamin Franklin’s words in 1787, the year the Constitution was first signed. Said he: “I agree to this Constitution … and I believe, further, that this is likely to be well administered for a course of years, and can end only in despotism (tyranny), as other forms have done before it, when the people shall become so corrupted as to need despotic government, being incapable of any other.”

Later he would declare, “Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious they have more need of masters.”

Has that day Franklin spoke of arrived? Possibly.

While watching the upcoming generation, those 30 and under, I think of a scripture found in Judges 2:10-12 that reads “And also all that generation were gathered unto their fathers: and there arose another generation after them, which knew not the Lord, nor yet the works which he had done for Israel. And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord, and served Baalim: And they forsook the Lord God of their fathers, which brought them out of the land of Egypt, and followed other gods, of the gods of the people that were round about them, and bowed themselves unto them, and provoked the Lord to anger.”

Many in America’s rising generation could well fit this description of Israel’s “upcoming generation” anciently: They know not the God of America’s Founders, Jefferson’s “Creator” and “Supreme Judge” of the world, the God the Founders believed was the God of the Old Testament’s Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

It is this rising generation that has been cheated by America’s educational system, a system that is being transformed by a power-hungry federal government that, with a growing distain for America’s foundational principles, denied this rising generation the opportunity to know the God of America’s Founders, the God of their freedom or how it was founded on the religious truths of the Founders’ Bibles’ truths that helped America win an unwinnable war and then become a beacon to the world’s enslaved, a beacon of light based on the Judao/Christian moral foundation set in stone on Mt. Sinai by Jehovah himself.

As we ponder the seeds of tyranny being sown to an unsuspecting America I think of Jefferson’s words, “All that tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent.”

Thus I am grateful for the tea party movement that continues to grow, and will continue to grow as this administration continues its assaults on America’s law-abiding citizens via the Justice Department (freedom of press) and the IRS, targeting tea party organizers such as Cherokeean Jenny Beth Martin, who heads a national Tea Party organization.

Recent revelations (a meaningful religious word) have brought to light the arrogance of a corrupt administration, an arrogance that has tended to wake up a nations citizenry that had fallen asleep and forgot that “Freedom is not free” and that tyrants are always alert for opportunities to become their masters, believing, as tyrants do, that the people are not capable of governing themselves and need masters — them.

With an ever-growing $16 trillion debt America should also ponder well the words of Thomas Jefferson: “To preserve our independence, we must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt … I am for a government rigorously frugal and simple.”

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